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Interesting that Lisa and the ilk never noticed how many people back in the “W” days were taking jobs at much lower pay, or taking 2-3 jobs to “break even”, but “unemployment” stayed down, well not really.

7.6% isn’t fantastic, but it’s below the 8% all the repubtards said Obama couldn’t lower. But, it isn’t just the White House, not even “W” who should be blamed, but the combination of a Congress that has too long handed “corporate America” a free pass, to pass jobs overseas.

Just reading about one of our major aviation “job contributors”, looking to Mexico, or points south, rather than in the U.S.. Ah, patriotism.

Just more apologists for the Destructer of the American Dream.Barry knew that Obama(non)Care would cost trillions and cost people their jobs. It’s just part of his plan to expand socialism and force Everbody to become dependent on the governments “generosity” as they dole out our allowance each month.

The Fed’s monthly report concluded that the “downside risks” were reduced. Housing is coming back. The stock market is up. Profits are at record levels. The sequester cuts haven’t sabotaged growth. Consumers feel more confidence.

Only one problem with all this. The economy can’t recover if the people don’t. Official unemployment has drifted down to an abysmal 7.6 percent but largely because people are dropping out of the workforce.

There are still over 20 million people in need of full time work. The employment rate — the percentage of the population in the workforce — hasn’t budged from recession levels. At current rates, the U.S. won’t return to the pre-recession 5 percent unemployment rate until 2022 — and even at that level, American families were losing ground.

Corporate profits are up, but wages aren’t. Wages are now at the lowest percent of the economy on record. The median wage hasn’t budged this century. College and non-college grads are now losing ground. The good jobs that were lost are being replaced by low wage and part-time jobs. Young people are starting out behind, unemployed or underemployed at ruinous high rates. Our Gilded Age inequality is getting worse, with the top 1 percent pocketing all of the rewards of growth.I

When Clinton was president, people had jobs. Unemployment was down. Income taxes were slightly higher. The economy soared. There was a projected budget surplus. Crime was down. Inflation was down. -And Republicans HATED it. HATED it. And they vowed never to allow it to happen again. -And their success at preventing such horror continues today.

I would like to remind Brain that Clinton pushed through the law that caused the recession.

I, of course, agree with the right-wingnuts that the law FORCED banks to lend to people who could not repay.

But first, recall the scorpion that begged a frog for a lift across a stream, pointing out that, if he stung the frog, they’d both die. Then he stung the frog. ‘Why?’ asked the frog. ‘Because it’s my nature.‘

(And anyway, the government rescued the biggest scorpion bankers, as they knew it had to, so only the smallest scorpion bankers drowned.)

In Rand, a banker only makes good loans until the government passes a law that he must loan his depositors’ money to Friends of the administration who have neither the legal obligation nor the intention to repay a penny, so he closes his bank.

In real life, it is the nature of real (as opposed to Randian) bankers to loan money to people who cannot repay, sell the loans promising, ’They’re all backed by collateral worth more than the loan’, then using the proceeds from selling those loans to make more loans until…

But this was all illegal before Clinton pushed through the law repealing the law making it illegal, after which the scorpion bankers just followed their nature, so they were FORCED to make and sell those loans and drive the world economy into the ditch.

(Right wingnuts say it was the law against redlining, but everyone who’s had middle school economics knows that’s not true. But it was still a Clinton law that caused the crisis.)

Surely it makes sense to create a health care plan that every employer must offer to its full time employees. Oh wait, how about not offering medical coverage to part timer’s but hire more people so it can be said there was job creation. It’s so ironic it’s almost funny.

We’ve had 4-1/2 years of Obama’s machinations. He had a Congress completely in liberal control for a good chunk of that. Instead of focusing on creating the PPACA (which actually costs the country over $1 trillion, after being advertised as debt neutral, then costing less than $1 trillion… oops), he should have focused on figuring out a way to generate employment. I don’t mean government jobs, I mean working with actual industry leaders and figuring out a plan to get people back to work.

You guys are so hung up on the 2010 elections that you forget you had 2008-2010 to get stuff done. And all you could accomplish was the extremely partisan PPACA, forced on the American People by gimmicks and procedural tricks. Imagine if Obama had spent that much political energy and capital on jobs.

I want to pull out a piece of your comment that I think is a common fallacy. The stock market is up, and profits at record levels. There is a reason behind this that people aren’t recognizing, and they are blaming corporations for it.

Stock market (aka the DOW) is only a sampling of businesses. It doesn’t represent every company. And the treasury has been buying bonds at a rate of $85 billion a month, as part of their quantitative easing. Look at the way the market reacted when when it was announced that QE3 would be coming to a close: The DOW shed some 500 points in 2-3 days, iirc. It was a bloodbath. It’s because investors know the truth: The DOW has been propped up by QE. It’s a false high. The DOW is overvalued right now.

Secondly, the profits. A lot of this is a result of the Internet bubble in 2k, and again the recession in 2008-10’ish. Companies shed jobs in both cases, largely because they had to lean operations down. Things like Six Sigma, and L.E.A.N. were analyzed. Computerization was and continues to be the biggest inroads at efficiency.

And that’s what we’re seeing. Corporations are running much leaner, putting more work on fewer people and automating a lot of things. Equipment can also be depreciated, which is considered an expense on an accounting balance sheet. Fewer employees with same output + more equipment with depreciation = higher profit margins with same level of revenue, or even a modest increase in revenue.

And then there is the other issue that is the elephant in the room: the PPACA and its impact on the employment picture. Whether you are for or against the PPACA, it will cost money and jobs. Either companies are going to have to increase coverage (aka cost more money), or they are going to have to shed jobs, or both. We’ve already heard many reports, especially from the Chamber of Commerce, that the #1 reason why companies aren’t hiring is because they still don’t know what the PPACA is going to mean for their businesses. And the PPACA is the direct reason for the above ‘toon. It has the 50 FTE benchmark. So businesses are replacing 1 full time with 1-1/2 part time workers to do the same task, thus escaping the mandate from the Law.

A lot of people look at today’s economy and say that corporations are causing the problem. The rich are causing the problem. But compare our current automotive manufacturing process and compare it to Ford back in the 50’s. Then, you had workers assembling the vehicle, bolt by bolt. Now, you have robots that do the same job, and can even repair each other. You tell someone in the 50’s that a machine would be doing their job, and they’d scoff at you. Now, it’s the norm. Technology is the biggest form of efficiency advancement, and we are now reaping those benefits. Unfortunately, it makes the employment situation in our time much … more difficult.

Wjhat did the dims and Obama do the first two years when they had the house and the senate?Obamacare.No jobs.In fact they sped up the job losses.Then they lost the house and some of the senate.Did any of that sink in yet?

It’s more like 23% without the gerrymandered numbers.195,000 new jobs last month. A weekly average of 345,000 newly unemployed last month.Times 4 weeks thats 1,380,00 last month. Even the weed head dems can do simple math.Well…maybe not.